Listening to: Breaking Benjamin - What Lies Beneath.
Mirror Mirror.
She sits alone in the corner of a room painted white. White walls, white sheets, white floor. There are no windows to the outside world. This is the only world she knows now.
The walls are bare, save for a single plain-framed mirror by the door.
In her hands lies an old and tattered book. With her dainty pale white fingers, she traces the words printed on the creased, yellowing pages.
“Once upon a time,” she began to read, in a small and delicate voice. “There lived a lovely little Princess named Snow White.”
Sitting silently, she imagines to herself the face of this so-called princess. Lips red as a rose. Hair black as ebony. Skin white as snow.
Innocent and sweet, looking eagerly to the future.
Turning the page, she read, “Her vain and wicked Stepmother, the Queen, feared that someday, Snow White's beauty would surpass her own*-”
Suddenly, a high-pitched scream erupts from outside the room, a sound that would be unsettling for anyone else, but not this girl.
She simply closes the book and places it back gently on the shelf. Lying down on the flawlessly made bed, she closes her eyes.
Pretty princesses and wicked witches. The ideals of such things swirl around in her head.
Stories like these aren’t so different to the real world, if you think about it. It’s just that in reality, people aren’t always as they seem.
There was a time, though it seemed like centuries ago, that she had been afraid of the dark; terrified of what creatures laid in wait for her through the blackness.
“Don’t be afraid of things that don’t exist,” someone had once told her. “In our world, people are the real monsters.”
The screaming has died down, finally. There is nothing but silence now.
Not even the whistle of the wind or the chirping of crickets is present, but it’s not as if she can remember what those sound like anymore.
Then, footsteps.
Two of them, as it seems. Quick and precise, they proceed down the hallway, echoing as they go by.
They stay still for a little while and she strains her ears to listen. They’re standing at the door of the room next to hers. All she can hear is the sound of faint murmurs.
Then, the voices move closer. They're in front of her door now. Their conversation is low and hushed, but she can hear a few words at a time.
"Her.. as a child.."
"... Really?"
“.. suicide watch.”
Finally, she doesn't care anymore. She's heard enough to know that she doesn't want to listen any longer.
She rolls on her side and tucks her knees to her chin. Eventually, the two people outside leave, but not without uttering the last word she especially didn't want to hear.
"... Matricide."
After a while in silence, she sits up and walks over to the mirror next to the door. She peers into the glass, staring into her reflection. She stares into her soul, or what is left of it.
Her lips are no longer red as roses; they can only quiver into a faint pink frown.
Her hair is no more the sleek ebony black it once was; just dry, messy strands.
And her skin?
Though gaunt and paler than it had ever been, it is still as white as snow.
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Behind the Story
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